Villas In Porthmadog

Reviews

What our customers say about their holidays

• Trevor - Verified booking

  The instructions given by Sykes to gain entry to the apartment are confusing.

  The address given for The Old Cornhill is No 6 (which is actually the number for the whole building. However, the Old Cornhill door has a Number 2 on it. But there are also two doors with Number 2 on them - OC and Cornhill Courtyard, which are sometimes let together as a single unit. You need to use the door at the back of the building, along the dank, rubbish strewn short alley way. There is however. a much easier way of locating the correct door. You are told to enter the courtyard and the OC entrance is round the back. Once in the courtyard, there are very clear nameplates next to each door, that identify The Old Cornhill and Cornhill Courtyard - that's what the location instructions should say. There are two key boxes – use the one on the left of the front door. And the 5 digit code you are given is incorrect as the key box has only 4 digits. You need to omit the 0 at the end of the number you are given. It seems to us that the apartment was renovated for holiday lets about 15 years ago and has been left to fall into decline ever since. The two sofas are saggy, shabby and uncomfortable and the cushion covers are stained. The mattress falls away at its edges as the edge springs have failed. There is a lot of black mould on the grout in the shower. The bathroom sink plug hole does not fit and your bowl of water will seep away whilst you are using it. The kitchen sink tap drips when on full cold. The front door is not very secure and better locks would be advisable. The windows are draughty and the wind whistles through them. The electrical items display stickers that state the last electrical test was in November 2022. There is an iron with a ‘failed – do not use’ sticker on it. There is an airer that has a broken catch so you have to lean it up against something otherwise it falls over. The oven door doesn’t close properly. The detergent drawer of the washing machine was full of black mould. The freezer is heavily frosted up and, as a result, we could only open one of the three drawers. The cooker hood filters smell strongly of grease. The kitchen is fairly well equipped but there are only 2 teaspoons and 2 mugs and a pair of tongs would be useful. One of the wine glasses was cracked. Many of the glasses have dishwasher burn. We could hear every footstep made by the users of the apartment above us and, from our bathroom, we could hear nearly every word said by the users of the apartment alongside. The listing says there is a patio or outdoor seating area. This takes the form of a few pieces of broken and dirty garden furniture against the wall in the courtyard where residents park and the bins are stored. The bins were overflowing and there was rubbish on the ground in the courtyard. One bin, in particular, was overflowing when we arrived and was only emptied a fortnight later just as we were leaving. The gateway to the courtyard is very narrow and the courtyard has room for 2 cars if they are parked well. The spaces outside the building, on the road, were always taken and so we parked in one of the 20 or so free-to-park spaces outside the Tafarn Pencei pub 50 yards along the road. We managed to get a space there every time we needed one. The listing states the apartment has a TV. Being 15 years old, it is not a smart TV and only offers the freeview channels, rather than what current day expectations of a TV would be. The remote control for the TV does not work (we changed the batteries and it still did not work) so you have to use the channel and sound buttons on the back of the TV to turn on, change channel and sound. The USB port on the side of the TV does not work. There is a blu-ray player but it and the TV do not ‘talk to one another’ and so the blu-ray player is useless. We reported this to Sykes Cottages AKA Menai Holidays by phone on our second day (when they called us to reset the router as the lady downstairs had a problem with wi-fi) and did not receive a response for 5 days. They sent round a ‘technician’ in our absence to fix another problem with downstairs' access, as well as ours, but our problems were not even looked at, let alone fixed. The downstairs issue was "fixed" by the expedient of taping a card to one of the plug switches saying "do not turn off" - which card could only be read if it was lifted up - it was not placed so you could easily read the instruction. We reported this to Sykes/Menai via the portal as it was a weekend and the phone lines were closed, but never heard from them again. It seems they were only interested in appeasing the complaints from the tenant in Cornhill Courtyard, rather than the problems we were experiencing. They even closed our call before we got back from our day out and could receive my feedback as to whether the issue had been resolved or not. As it was a Saturday, phoning hte office resulted in a "we are closed" message, hence notifying them via the official channel of the Portal.

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• Deirdre - Verified booking

  I love this property and this was my second stay here over the Christmas week.

  The house is warm, comfortable, comfy bed, good main shower and has amazing views at the rear. It contains everything you need at a holiday rental. It's full of character and history. It's perfectly located in Borth y Gest, only minutes walk to the beach and harbour. We've never had any issues parking in BYG even in peak season, we visit a lot as my partner spent his childhood here and we both love the area. We didn't use the garden as it was winter but I'm sure it is lovely in the warmer weather. I have to admit, I'd read the reviews from October and November before my stay and I was worried about what the property would be like when I arrived. I didn't find anything like the reviews say. However, that said, the property was not as clean as my previous visit in December 2023. The kitchen was in need of a good deep clean, kick boards were very grubby, cupboards and splash back tiles had drips and splashs on from previous guests, a lot of crumbs in and under the toaster. Under the front of the cooker was a layer of grime that the mop was clearly was not getting for some time. The bottom oven didn't work, we didn't need it, but had I have wanted to cook a Christmas meal here, I would have needed someone out to sort it. The top oven was so smokey, it made my eyes water, so I abandoned warming up my bread rolls and had them cold. Most doors were grubby with hand marks etc. and skirting boards, upstairs in particular, were dusty with lots of cobwebs around the radiators. The covers on the sofas were grubby particularly on the back of the one in the window, as were the cushions. The windows were very dirty and when the sun briefly came out, you couldn't see through them particularly at the front of the property. None of the above was a major issue during my stay but it has put me off booking again. For a premium priced property, I expect a little more. I will say there were no dog hairs anywhere which I'm grateful for, as I have a poodle who doesn't shed, so I'm not used to dog hair. The Internet on the TV didn't work as the connection box for the TV was missing from the property so we only had basic TV for the week. Again not a major issue for us. I was contacted 2 and a half hours after I left the property to ask if I'd taken a cushion from the sofa by mistake which I was a bit miffed about. I'm really not sure why I would. Overall this is a nice property but it needs a deep clean. My previous stay had been perfect.

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• Joanne - Verified booking

  The position of this property is absolutely perfect!

  The views through the glass walls are stunning and you feel like you are in the middle of nowhere, yet you are only 5 minutes away from every possible amenity in Porthmadog. The perfect base to explore coast and mountains. The house is packed with traditional character but has been modernised to make life as easy as possible. With the exception of the kitchen, every room is spacious and contains plenty of storage. The kitchen is very narrow, preventing more than one person from being involved in the cooking, but it does contain everything you could need, including modern oven, hob, microwave, dishwasher, washing machine, a large fridge/freezer, and plenty of cutlery, crockery and utensils. The garden has wonderful panoramic views with a spacious patio, and is positioned for maximum privacy - you are not overlooked at all by the other two properties on the grounds. There were two negatives for us: Firstly, the creaky floorboards upstairs. This sounds minor, but the loudness of the creak with every step you take in both bedrooms and the landing never fails to wake the entire household. Not great if people go to bed at different times or need to visit the bathroom in the night. Secondly, the property would benefit from a few fans - the internal temperature was over 30 degrees Celsius for the majority of time we were there. This meant we had to keep the glass doors constantly open, and this allowed the flies, wasps, butterflies, bees, and ever dragonflies in. I am not exaggerating when I say that we swept up more than 50 dead winged creatures every day. The property was absolutely spotless on arrival, but it soon lost its clean feeling with the onslaught of so many bugs - no food could be left uncovered for even a few minutes. Nothing some decent fans couldn't fix. Overall, the positives definitely outweigh the negatives and we thoroughly enjoyed our holiday.

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• Anthony - Verified booking

  If I could give no stars I would about the property .

  We turned up excited for our stay our holiday and rest was needed . When we opened front door we knew that we wouldn’t be staying. The house had a very bad smell of damp and urine . We went in to look and there was damp on wall soon as u entered property. The wooden floors were stained and rugs well they were fit for bin . We further investigated upstairs there was no proper handrails only a rope to get up . If you have a disability then this is a big problem nowhere in the description of let did it say not suitable for disabled persons. The stair treads were cracked and ready to split . Going out to the rear of property you have to descend into a basement area which the smell was absolutely disgusting. It was damp and mouldy on walls . Looked really spooky . Wouldn’t really want to be letting my dog out late at night down there as there’s no front garden . As you can see it wasn’t great it was that bad we didn’t stay 1 NIGHT we went straight home very disappointed . We rang Skye’s and told them hoping they as the letting agent would assist .NO THEY DIDNT they said contact OWNER we paid £600 to SYKES SO THEY SHOULD SORT IT !!! The owner then said we should of stayed to give them time to rectify the PROBLEMS!!! We don’t want to stay on HOLIDAY when people are coming in deep cleaning or changing rugs or painting damp walls or fixing stairs !! I HOPE PEOPLE SEE THIS AS RIGHT AND THAT AM NOT BEING UNREASONABLE TO STAY IN A HOUSE THAT NEEDED REPAIR !!! After speaking to the cleaner/OWNER THEY INFORMED ME THEY HAVE SHUT THE HOUSE DOWN FOR S MONTH TO SORT THE ISSUES OUT AS ITS BEEN A LONG YEAR OF LETTINGS

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• Elizabeth - Verified booking

  House is in a great location and views from the property are stunning , really easy to get to Porthmadog and around via bus or car .

  We had no issues with parking at the house and loved waking up to the views , the bed was very comfy. The house is a good space , but it really needs a deep clean and the overall upkeep of the house we felt let the stay down. For example, the bath anti slip had pink mould on it, the bedroom had mould, bathrooms had very mouldy grout, fridge was dirty, sofa covers marked etc and not sure on the big rugs in the bathroom for hygiene reasons. When we arrived the house was very cold and was cold in the morning, it would be a nice touch if the heating could be put on before arrival. Once we located the thermostat it did warm up but there are no instructions for what to do with rubbish at the house , operation of heating etc so we had to guess. The tea and coffee canisters were pretty much empty, bin bags not placed in the bin and no surface spray or wipes etc to be found, so make sure you bring your own but a nice gesture of milk and Welsh cakes at the house! The stairs down into the garden are actually via an internal staircase which is fairly steep and the area smells strongly of mould - also not sure if someone lives in the downstairs area as it looked like another apartment. We felt a bit unsure/unsafe as it felt like someone had access from this area up to the main house as there is no lockable door between the house and internal basement stairs. This made us not want to use the garden so we took our dog around the block instead through the front door. £20 for a dog cleaning fee feels rather steep considering the overall condition of the property which has so much potential.

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